


Help, I'm Alone

by just_the_worst



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Gen, Mental Health Issues, Sadness, loss of friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-25
Updated: 2016-01-25
Packaged: 2018-05-16 03:23:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5811817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/just_the_worst/pseuds/just_the_worst
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a disastrous year, Pearl loses all connection to the people she cares most about.  Human/University AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Help, I'm Alone

**Author's Note:**

> For the purposes of this story, Steven is the same age as everyone else.

_Stranger 1: Hey, how’s your night going?_

_Stranger 2: eh, ive been better. How about u?_

_Stranger 1: Honestly, I feel like I regret all my life’s choices._

**_Stranger 2 has disconnected_ ** _._

“Figures…” Pearl muttered to herself, basking in the dim glow of her computer screen.

_Look at me. I’m so pathetic, random strangers are the only people I can talk to._

Life had not always been quite so lonely for Pearl.

She didn’t really have anyone to blame but herself.

_Well that’s not entirely true…_

* * *

 

“I never want you to contact me again. I will not ask a second time. Am I clear?”

Garnet’s words rang through Pearl’s head. A sick feeling had settled in her chest. Months later it still threatened to overwhelm her sometimes.

_Why did I have to push her so far? Why couldn’t I have just listened?_

“Look, we don’t want to associate with you anymore”

Lapis’ words had stung too, though not quite in the same way.

Lapis continued:

“You’ve hurt Steven too much. He defended you for so long… It was cute. But not even he wants anything to do with you anymore”

Lapis had spoken for herself, Amethyst and Steven, soon before the end of the school year. They had all been set to move out of their shared house anyway.

Lapis and Steven had extricated themselves from her life, full stop, even going so far as to remove themselves on social media.

Amethyst had instead opted for a passive approach; she simply remained silent throughout the whole affair. No goodbye, no confrontation. Pearl still saw her posts on social media, saw the games she played on Steam. In a way, Pearl became Amethyst’s ghost. Always observing, never interacting. What could she even say?

_Hey, sorry we all went through a living hell for months on end. I have medication now?_

Somehow, Pearl didn’t think that was going to cut it.

Peridot had been carefully neutral throughout the whole conflict, despite being Lapis’ girlfriend. The day she moved out she had wrapped Pearl in a tight hug.

“Well, I don’t quite know what the deal is with you and Lapis, but I’m still your friend”

Tears had welled in Pearl’s eyes as she said goodbye. Peridot was due to start graduate school internationally. Not being the most talkative of people, Pearl knew her chances of keeping in touch with Peridot were slim.  

A few months after everyone had moved out Pearl had sent Steven a text, hoping maybe time had healed some of the wounds. She asked if he was willing to put water under the bridge. He never replied.

She had given Amethyst a gift on Steam, a game Pearl knew she’d like. A few months later, Amethyst had played the game for two days straight, confirming her theory.

Had Amethyst accepted her gift? Or had she simply bought the game for herself during the winter sale?

Again, Amethyst remained silent, offering Pearl no clues.

She missed all of them more than she could readily admit. More than she could stand, some days.

* * *

 

It had been a **bad** year.

It had started right in January.

Pearl had found she was unable to handle even the most basic of tasks. Pearl was no stranger to depression, but this was far worse than anything she had ever experienced. She dropped her classes, despite being due to graduate. She stopped leaving the house almost entirely. Steven had made her food so that she wouldn’t starve, even though the thought of eating made her nauseous, most days. They’d seal themselves in his room, and binge watch anime while Amethyst was out.

While Pearl rarely left Steven’s room, Lapis seldom left their couch. She would plant herself there in the morning and absently browse the internet or play Skyrim until it was eventually time to crawl back into bed with Peridot.

Peridot, for her part, was doing quite well, balancing between going to the lab to work on her thesis and helping her morose girlfriend admirably.

As time wore on, Steven began to get increasingly worried.

One day, Lapis confronted Pearl in the kitchen:

“You’re wearing him out”

“I know. I’m sorry”

Pearl had found there was little she could do. She simply didn’t have the energy.

During all this, in the background, Pearl was utterly destroying her friendship with Garnet.

Garnet didn’t live with Peridot, Pearl, Steven and Amethyst (Lapis technically didn’t live with them, though that was truly a technicality by that point). Garnet instead attended art school in a different city.

For as long they had been going to university Pearl had been writing to Garnet. She would tell her about the sorts of things that were going on around her, like that time Peridot had become obsessed with _Supremacy_ by Muse and had listened to it literally non-stop for three days. Or the time that Peridot had decided to cook a “test ham” for their upcoming Christmas party but had forgotten to scale the proportions down so it was appropriate for just the four of them. They ate leftover ham for _months_. Garnet didn’t often write back, but she regularly assured Pearl that she appreciated the gesture, as she almost never talked to anybody.

They didn’t often visit with each other, but Pearl always looked forward to it. She couldn’t help it. She had been completely smitten by Garnet almost the moment they had met, seven years prior.

Pearl had been completely unable to contain her excitement over the ending of _Legend of Korra_. Being at home with her mother for Christmas, she had no one to freak out with. Earlier that day, she and Garnet had been hanging out, just talking, for about eight hours straight. Pearl had explained how she, Lapis, Steven and Amethyst hoped that Korrasami would be a thing, but genuinely didn’t think that Nickelodeon would ever go for it.

She had sent Garnet a massively over-excited e-mail about it.

Garnet had been a bit dismayed about being spoiled (Pearl didn’t feel too guilty. It was big news. There was no way Garnet would have stayed unspoiled for any significant length of time). At Pearl’s insistence they scheduled a time for Garnet to marathon _Korra_ with Pearl in a couple weeks, right before school started up again.

Pearl had thought she was going to vibrate into the stratosphere she was so excited. She found herself unable to sleep for nearly three days. In an attempt to finally get some rest, she decided to have entirely too much to drink with Amethyst.

For some reason, it had seemed like a great idea to explain how she felt about Garnet to her via text. In horrific detail. For hours.

It hadn’t even occurred to Pearl to be upset until the next morning when she had received an e-mail wherein Garnet explained that she was no longer comfortable visiting with her.

The news had hit her like a ton of bricks. She’d been inconsolable, despite everyone’s best efforts.

Eventually, she had attempted to craft an e-mail of apology and explanation.

Garnet had accepted, and things were passable, for a time.

* * *

 

Pearl then tried to focus on getting better. She created a schedule for herself, one activity per day.

She wrote to Garnet often, too often.

At first, she had been patient, understanding.

She had requested that she stop, nicely.

For some reason, Pearl had found it impossible to do so. Even now, she can’t describe why she couldn’t listen to her oldest friend’s wishes.

Garnet became increasingly frustrated, until she could take no more:

“You’re not my friend anymore, you’re my problem. Think carefully before writing to me again”

As Pearl talked too much to Garnet, it became not enough for Steven and Amethyst.

Steven had been carefully trying to keep the peace between Lapis and Pearl. Although Pearl hadn’t been interacting much with Lapis, it was this non-interaction that had infuriated her.

“…she thinks you’re taking advantage of me”, Steven had told her, one night.

“Amethyst is worried too, though she won’t say anything. She wishes you would talk to her…”

“I wrote you a thing on facebook about how everyone’s feeling. I think you should read it”

When Pearl had checked facebook, said message had been well over 1000 words long.

As her eyes skimmed the message, Pearl’s heart constricted. She couldn’t do this. There was no way she could read an _essay_ about how terrible she was making everyone feel.

“Steven, could you please just tell me what it says?”, Pearl had said, resigned.

“No!” Steven shot back, heatedly, “I put a lot of work into writing that so that I could get the wording just right!”

“Seriously, Steven, I’m not going to read it”

“Really?!  You’ll write a novel to Garnet, but won’t even read one message from me?!”

“Just summarize it! I _can’t_ read that”

“Forget it! I need to take a break from you anyway”

“Fine”

With that, Pearl had left Steven’s room and returned to her own.

_It’ll be fine. We both just need some time to cool down_.

A week later, Pearl had returned from a shopping trip and caught Steven in the kitchen.

“Hey, Steven! Look at this cool camera I got”

Steven had just stared at her mutely before going up to his room.

Later she received a message on facebook explaining how he still “needed a break from her”.

Pear was at once angry and hurt.

_Oh gee. I’m sorry that saying ‘hi’ is too much for you to handle. How difficult that must be._

And so Pearl secluded herself. It wasn’t so bad. There had been those times before, when she had first started living with Peridot that she would hide and wait until Peridot was out of earshot before doing anything in shared areas.

It was only a _minor_ panic she would experience when she was in one of the common areas when any of the others were around.

* * *

 

If Pearl had thought she had hit bottom, it was only because she had no idea how deep the pit could get.

No, that came later, once everyone had moved out.

Truly, it was the little things that always struck Pearl.

“Damnit. I don’t have a can-opener”, Pearl realised as she attempted to make soup one afternoon _. We always used Peridot’s…_

Pearl had then struggled for about half an hour trying to get the can opened with her Swiss Army knife. Pearl was not as rugged as she might have hoped. Although she did eventually best the can, she did not come out unscathed; she sliced her hand in the process.

Peridot’s can opener had been a thing of beauty, being of an overly fancy German design. It had taken Pearl at least six months to figure out how to use it. It had taken Amethyst significantly longer, while Steven merely accepted his inability to use it properly.

_Damn. I miss Peridot…_

* * *

 

Amethyst had sent Pearl the last of the utility money she owed Pearl.

**online banking password question:**

Who da best?

Pearl inputted the answer with a sad smile:

youdabest

It was a stupid thing she and Amethyst had said back and forth to each other all the time when they were particularly stressed…

“Peaaaaaaarrrlll…. you know who’s going to rock that oral presentation tomorrow?” Amethyst had asked Pearl, the night before they were both due to give a ten minute oral presentation to a panel of their professors. They both _hated_ oral presentations. Pearl was practically shaking with anxiety.

“Hitler? I hear he was an excellent orator”

“…nooooo. You get one more try”

“Ughhhh….!” Pearl put her head in her hands.

“It’s you! You know why?”

“Because I’m going to spontaneously combust and that will distract everyone from how terrible my presentation is?”

“No, although spontaneously combusting in the middle of your presentation would be pretty awkward”, Amethyst had said, thoughtfully.

“Awkward? Someone spontaneously combusts and your first thought is how awkward it would be?”

“Well yeah! Think about it. Everyone would be looking at you… expecting you to drop and roll…”

“IT’S A PRESENTATION. EVERYONE WILL ALREADY BE LOOKING AT ME”

“That’s beside the point! You don’t get to derail this conversation, missy!” , Amethyst had waggled a finger at her teasingly. “In summary, the answer to the question of ‘who da best’ is clearly and plainly you. You da best”

Pearl had shaken her head, but she had felt a little bit better.

_Holy hell do I ever miss Amethyst…_

* * *

 

It just seemed there were a million small things to remind Pearl of what she’d lost.

_Oh look, lime chips are on sale. Amethyst would be so excited…_

_Polymorphic lesbian snake-people? Lapis would LOVE this cartoon…_

_Someone wrote a paper about how well garlic can deter vampires? Peridot would find that hilarious…_

_Garnet’s gotta be glad that Moffat’s finally retiring…_

_A pie eating contest? That would fill Steven with pie. And also regret. But mostly pie._

Every day, it got a little easier. Pearl knew she had a long road ahead if she was going to put all this behind her. Maybe, someday some of her friends would want her back. She’d bide her time until then, but Pearl wasn’t holding her breath.

**Author's Note:**

> Pearl still misses her friends... BUT HER AIM IS GETTING BETTER. It's funny because losing your friends is terrible. 
> 
> I'm sorry if that didn't really feel like it made sense. I hope at least one other person likes this piece of trash...
> 
> The garlic paper is real by the way (Sandvic & Baerheim, 1994). Conclude from that what you will...


End file.
